WHAT WAS THAT MASKED GARDEN?

                             

I don’t know why I was thinking of Last Year at Marienbad when we were getting ready to visit the Laking Garden in Burlington. There was no more than the slightest similarity of geometrical design between the vast lawn where most of its exteriors were shot (whose statues were slightly more real than the grass, less sculpted than the trees) and the Garden grounds with profusion of irises and peonies in labelled rows, and even a small patch of clematis, a few stray hibiscus round rust red tree-constructs. I’d have to see the film again to be sure, but I wouldn’t be surprised if there were not a single flower to be seen on that immaculately manicured lawn the whole length of the film. Then it occurred to me: the masks! I was going with a medical mask, better than half the people we met there in passing had them too, and Marienbad (never seen in the film, because it was last year, which is notoriously difficult to photograph) was a town famous for its health spa.

I saw a deep purple iris I didn’t remember from last year called Anvil of Darkness, which cracked me up: by day an unassuming flower, by night a sturdy tool for pounding a horse shoe into shape.

I wouldn’t have called that middle-tone violet iris Zebra Night; it seems to me you need some kind of striping for a name like that.

A robin perched in a red iron tree form barren of leaves, except for the vine climbing up it on which bloomed a light purple hibiscus (a shade deeper than Zebra Night)—couldn’t get Marysia over with a camera quickly enough to capture the tableau.

Reading in a corner of the garden, on chairs conveniently provided—a fine occupation with a garden for backdrop over the top of your page: Rodge Glass’s biography of Alasdair Gray. I’m told (or more likely reminded, though I can’t remember from when) that Alasdair Gray did a comic lecture at a 1959 Scottish Fringe venue on the useful topic: How to Assemble Your Own Rhinoceros. I should try to find that lecture—did anyone ever bother to get it down on tape? I have most of the required parts, but I could use some tips on how to assemble them.

FOLLOW SOCIAL DISTANCING PROCEDURES

WASHROOM OCCUPANCY IS LIMITED TO ONE (1) PERSON AT A TIME

*Note: Co-Habitants Excluded*

            Please Knock Before Entering

(I should say so if there’s any wee chance someone’s taking advantage of the co-habiting loophole.)